Is T.J. Leaf the UCLA basketball team’s MVP so far?

Freshman T.J. Leaf  had a career-high 25 points and 8 assists to go along with 10 rebounds in No. 2 UCLA's 102-62 win over UCSB on Wednesday night.

Freshman T.J. Leaf had a career-high 25 points and 8 assists to go along with 10 rebounds in No. 2 UCLA’s 102-62 win over UCSB on Wednesday night.

That fact that it’s even a discussion is a high enough compliment to T.J. Leaf. The “other freshman” has been good enough to join the conversation with Lonzo Ball about who UCLA’s most valuable player has been during the team’s 11-0 start. Pretty good company, to put it lightly, considering Ball is probably the current leading candidate for National Player of the Year.

The two classmates put on a show last night in No. 2 UCLA’s 102-62 win over UCSB. Leaf finished two assists shy and Ball three assists shy of their first collegiate triple-doubles. To put that in perspective, there are just four triple-doubles in the prestigious history of the UCLA basketball program. Leaf had a career-high 25 points and eight assists to go along with 10 rebounds. Ball had 13 points, 10 rebounds and seven assists.

As the point guard, Ball’s impact is more difficult to measure. In fact, the best gauge is probably the win column and UCLA is obviously unscathed in that area. But Leaf’s numbers are impossible to ignore. He is UCLA’s leading scorer at 18.3 points per game and the second-leading rebounder with 9.4 per game. Looking a little deeper, his shooting percentage (68%) is the best on the team leading the nation in shooting percentage. He has the heft to bang in the paint and the skill to score from anywhere, evidenced by shooting 54 percent from 3-point range. Oh yeah, in UCLA’s biggest game of the season, he had 17 and 13 at Kentucky. It’s hard to argue anybody other than Ball is the team’s MVP, but what Leaf is doing thus far is exceptional.

Here are links to last night’s coverage:

  • The game story, more about Leaf and Ball’s pursuit of statistical milestones than the scoreboard
  • A notebook leading with UCLA’s agreement to play Kentucky, Ohio State and North Carolina in 2017, 2018 and 2019
  • Video of Lonzo Ball’s postgame press conference, where he said he was unaware of his near triple-double
  • Video of T.J. Leaf and Aaron Holiday (20 points, 6 assists) at the podium after the game
  • Video of Steve Alford, who also addressed Saturday’s upcoming meeting with Ohio State
  • Our John McCoy’s photo gallery from the game